2005-2006 Lectures
The Center for U.S. – Mexico Studies cordially invites you to its Lecture Series 2005 – 2006. This year’s series will highlight various perspectives on art and technology, public administration, math-physics, science education, Mexican political decentralization, and twentieth century Mexican classical and chamber music.
The Center for U.S. – Mexico Studies, seeking to foster greater understanding between our two nations, is pleased to host and promote lectures on issues of interest to both Mexico and the U.S. Previous lectures have included such issues as the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), analysis of domestic politics and foreign policy, issues in science and technology, transborder population, and cultural development in both countries. The Center has hosted Carlos Fuentes, Andres Oppenheimer, Elena Poniatowska, Ana Maria Salazar, Monica Verea, Peter M. Ward, Victoria Rodriguez, Adolfo Aguilar Zinser, Jacqueline Peschard, Arexi Urrutia, and Mario Moises Alvarez, among others, under the frame of this series.
Based on our success from previous years, we are extending the scope of the series to offer lectures in Mexico and UTD, under the X anniversary of the UTD-Mexico agenda. The commemoration will focus on the UTD – University of Guanajuato relationship, which launched the UTD-Mexico agenda ten years ago.
Thomas Linehan, Larry D. Terry, Adolfo Sanchez Valenzuela, Paul Ching-Wu Chu, Douglas Watson, Russell Hulse, Juan Carlos Romero Hicks, Ana Cervantes and Los Tiempos Pasados are scheduled in this academic year. The University of Texas at Dallas (UTD) students, faculty and staff, and those interested in U.S. – Mexico affairs from The University of Texas System (UT), from the metropolitan area of Dallas – Fort Worth and Guanajuato will benefit from the experience and expertise shared by these scholars.
If you have questions or need further information, please contact Gabriela Carrera, U.S.-Mexico Lecture Series Coordinator.
We look forward to seeing you in this series.
Thomas Linehan & Pablo Trinidad
Mathematics and Research Center A.C. (CIMAT)
Guanajuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
August 12, 2005
Computerized Animation: a Mathematical Perspective
Co-sponsored by the Interactive Institute of Art and Engineering at the University of Texas at Dallas and the CIMAT
Dr. Thomas Linehan has a background in both corporate management and educational administration. He has served as a college president, a corporate vice president, an associate dean, a research laboratory director, a professor and a public school teacher. Most recently, he served as the president of The Ringling School of Art and Design in Sarasota, Florida. There he directed successful ventures in: selective enrollment increases, consensus-based strategic planning, faculty governance reform, housing and instructional facilities construction, increased corporate collaboration, improved faculty/staff/student morale and the directed the best financial performance in the college’s history. As senior vice president of CRSS Architects, a world-wide design firm (400 architects and 15 offices), he managed a number of major corporate units and implemented CRSSe early entrance into advanced computer-based design and computer visualization. Dr. Linehan has experience in research and educational planning with the arts and technology. He has developed several premiere degree programs in media arts technology. (Ohio State University’s Advanced Computing Center for the Arts and Design, Texas A&M University’s Visualization Laboratory and The Ringling School of Art and Design’s Computer Animation Program.) Each of these programs provides an advanced computing environment in support of an industry-relevant education. Dr. Linehan has served as a consultant in the development of similar programs in The Netherlands, Germany, New Zealand and Canada.
Pablo Trinidad holds a B.S. in Computer Science and an M.A. in Arts and Technology from The University of Texas at Dallas. Pablo has collaborated at the Center for U.S.-Mexico Studies as a research assistant for four years while has created, designed, implemented and maintained the Center’s website. In addition Pablo has assisted the Director of the Center in the logistics of the UTD-Mexico agenda, including hosting guests and technical support for events. Since the summer 2005, Pablo collaborates in the design of the Center for Translation Studies´ web page. Pablo’s current interest is in the efficient development of visual design, and is currently working on his PhD in Arts and Technology under the supervision of Dr. Tomas Linehan, Director of the Institute of Interactive Arts and Engineering (IIAE).
Larry D. Terry & Stephanie Newbold
Law and Public Administration School at the University of Guanajuato
Guanajuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
August 25-27, 2005
Professionalizing the Public Administration: The Case of Bureaucracy
Co-sponsored by the American Embassy in Mexico and the University of Guanajuato
Larry D. Terry is Executive Vice Provost for Academic Affairs and Professor of Public Administration at The University of Texas at Dallas. Dr. Terry received his graduate degrees from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (PhD) and University of Missouri-Columbia (M.S.). He is widely known for his book, The Leadership of Public Bureaucracies: The Administrator As Conservator 2nd ed. (M.E. Sharpe, 2002). This book is currently used in graduate and executive development programs throughout the world. Leadership of Public Bureaucracies is recognized by many as an emerging classic in the field public administration and public affairs. Dr. Terry is Editor-in-Chief of Public Administration Review. In 1999, he was elected a fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration. Dr. Terry is the recipient of the American Society for Public Administration’s 1996-1997, William E. Mosher and Frederick C. Mosher Award. This prestigious and highly competitive award recognizes the best article by an academician published in the Public Administration Review. Professor Terry was given the “Alumni Outstanding Professional Accomplishment Award” by the College of Architecture at Virginia Tech. He also received the American Society for Public Administration, 2000 Presidential Citation of Merit Award, for his leadership of Public Administration Review and the Conference of Minority Public Administrators Citation of Merit Award for scholarly achievements. Dr. Terry is currently writing a book entitled, Administrative Interpretation of Law: How Public Administrators Create Meaning (Under contract with Georgetown University Press).
In addition to his academic career, Professor Terry has held a variety of administrative and staff positions at the federal, state, and local government levels. He has also served as a consultant and trainer to several diverse organizations such as the U.S. Department of the Army, the U.S. Forest Service and the Communications Workers of America (AFL-CIO) National Headquarters.
Stephanie Newbold is a doctoral candidate at the Center for Public Administration and Policy at Virginia Tech. Her research interests include public sector ethics, administrative history, political theory, and public management. She has worked for the Office of the White House Chief of Staff in the Clinton Administration and for the International Center for Jefferson Studies at Monticello. Currently, she is completing her dissertation on Thomas Jefferson’s contributions to the development of the American Administrative State and working for the Institute for Policy Outreach at Virginia Tech on coordinating statewide work incentives for disabled individuals.
Adolfo Sanchez Valenzuela
The University of Texas at Dallas
Richardson, Texas, U.S.A.
October 20, 2005, School of Management 2.803, 2:30-3:30 P.M.
Lie Superalgebras, and Natural Super-Spacetimes
Co-sponsored by the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics at UTD
Adolfo Sanchez Valenzuela is a mathematician from CIMAT (Centro de Investigacion en Matematicas A.C.); a center for research in mathematics in Guanajuato, Mexico. He has worked there since December 1987, after being a Junior Research Fellow at IIMAS-UNAM (Instituto de Investigaciones en Matematicas Aplicadas y en Sistemas) from September 1986 to December 1987. His PhD is from Harvard University obtained in June 1986, while his undergraduate studies are from the School of Sciences of the National University of Mexico, where he obtained the B.Sc. Degree in Physics in 1979, and the M.Sc. Degree in Physics in 1981.
He is currently Dean of the Graduate School at CIMAT and Director of the School of Mathematics of the University of Guanajuato. He has been a member of several distinguished scientific committees at the Mexican Academy of Sciences, and at the Mexican Bureau of Science and Technology (CONACyT), including a two-year presidency (2001-2002) of the Mathematics and Physics Committee of the National System of Research (SNI). He has been an SNI-fellow since 1987, and obtained the SNI’s highest rank in 2002. He has been a member of the Mexican Academy of Sciences since 1993, and he is currently the chairman of the Mathematics Section of this Academy.
His mathematical interests have always been inspired by his background in physics. His major contributions occur in the field of supermanifold theory and supersymmetry. He has published more than 30 scientific papers. He is also the author of 6 contributions for math students, and the author of several articles on science and mathematics for the general audience.
Douglas Watson
Law and Public Administration School at the University of Guanajuato
Salon del Consejo
Guanajuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
November 11, 2005 at 6:00 P.M.
The Importance of Professional Management in Local Government
Co-sponsored by the University of Guanajuato
Douglas J. Watson (PhD, Auburn University) is Professor of Public Affairs and head of the undergraduate and graduate programs in Public Affairs at the University of Texas at Dallas. Dr. Watson teaches courses in human resource management, economic development, organization theory, and local government management in the Master of Public Affairs program and the PhD program in Public Affairs. A former city manager, Dr. Watson won numerous awards for his work as a practitioner, including the National Public Service Award from the American Society for Public Administration and the L.P. Cookingham Award for Career Development and Orin Nolting International Award from the International City-County Management Association. He serves or has served on the editorial board of five peer-reviewed journals, including the Public Administration Review. He is the author, co-author, or editor of several books on local government in American cities, including Local Government Management: Current Issues and Best Practices. His work on local government issues has appeared in numerous academic and professional journals, as well as chapters in several books.
Paul Ching-Wu Chu
Mathematics and Research Center A.C. (CIMAT)
Auditorio
Guanajuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
November 17, 2005 at 12:20 P.M.
Chern and I
Co-sponsored by CIMAT
Dr. Paul C. W. Chu is currently serving as Professor of Physics, T. L. L. Temple Chair of Science, and Executive Director of the Texas Center for Superconductivity at the University of Houston, and as President of Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. He was born in Hunan, China, and received the B.S. degree from Cheng-Kung University in Taiwan. After service with the Nationalist Chinese Air Force, he earned the M.S. degree from Fordham University, Bronx NY, and completed the PhD degree at the University of California, San Diego, all three degrees being in Physics. He has been working on Superconductivity, Magnetism, and Dielectrics.
After doing industrial research with Bell Laboratories at Murray Hill, New Jersey, Dr. Chu held an academic appointment at Cleveland State University. He assumed his appointment at the University of Houston in 1979. He was Director of the Texas Center for Superconductivity at the University of Houston between 1987 and 2001. He had also served as consultant and visiting staff member at Bell Labs, Los Alamos National Lab, the Marshall Space Flight Center, Argonne National Lab, and DuPont at various times.
He has been working on superconductivity since his days with Bernd T. Matthias at the University of California at San Diego. In January 1987, Dr. Chu and his colleagues achieved stable superconductivity at 93 K (-180 C), above the critical temperature of liquid nitrogen (196 C). They continue to find new compounds with high transition temperatures. Recently, they again obtained stable superconductivity at a new record high temperature of 164 K (-109 C) in another compound when compressed. Presently, he is actively engaged in the basic and applied research of high temperature superconductivity. His research activities extend beyond superconductivity to magnetism and dielectrics. His work has resulted in the publication of more than 510 papers in refereed journals.
He has been elected as a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Beijing), the Academia Sinica (Taipei), the Third World Academy of Sciences, and the Electromagnetic Academy, and is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and the Texas Academy of Sciences. He has received honorary doctorates from Northwestern University, Fordham University, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Florida International University, The State University of New York at Farmingdale, Hong Kong Baptist University, and Whittier College. In 1990 he was selected the Best Researcher in the U.S. by US News and World Report.
He has received numerous awards, including the National Medal of Science, the International Prize for New Materials, the Comstock Award, Texas Instruments’ Founders’ Prize, the Leroy Randal Grumman Medal, the World Cultural Council Medal of Scientific Merit, the New York Academy of Sciences’ Physical and Mathematical Science Award, the Bernd Matthias Prize (M2S-HTSC), the Award of Excellence in Scientific Accomplishments (World Congress on Superconductivity), the St. Martin de Porres Award, the Esther Farfel Award (University of Houston), and the John Fritz Medal (American Association of Engineering Societies). He serves on the editorial boards of various professional journals and is a member of the board of directors of the Coalition for the Commercial Application of Superconductors.
Russell Hulse
University of Guanajuato
Guanajuato, Guanajuato, Mexico
Date: TBA
Science, from Nobel to Neighborhoods
Co-sponsored by the Office of the Vice President for Research and Academic Development at UTD
Russell Hulse was born and grew up in New York City, graduating from the Bronx High School of Science in 1966 and receiving his Bachelor of Science degree in Physics from The Cooper Union in 1970. For graduate work, he attended the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, where he received his PhD in Physics in 1975, having carried out thesis research in radio astronomy involving a successful high sensitivity search for pulsars based on novel computational processing of the radio signals. After a post-doctoral appointment at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Charlottesville, Virginia, Russell switched fields to controlled thermonuclear fusion research, joining Princeton University’s Plasma Physics Laboratory in 1977. At PPPL, he worked on computer modeling of atomic processes and transport in high-temperature plasmas, working closely with experimentalists on various controlled fusion devices at PPPL and elsewhere in the United States and internationally. In 1993, Russell received the Nobel Prize in Physics for his discovery of the first binary pulsar in 1974 during the course of the pulsar search that formed the basis for his PhD thesis. Russell shared the Prize with Joe Taylor, his former thesis advisor at UMass. Subsequent long-term observations of the binary pulsar by Joe Taylor and colleagues have led to important tests and verifications of Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity. In recent years, Russell has devoted his time to science education, various advisory committees, and a range of research interests. He is a Visiting Professor of Physics and of Science and Mathematics Education at the University of Texas at Dallas, and a Principal Research Physicist and Distinguished Research Fellow at Princeton University’s Plasma Physics Laboratory.
Juan Carlos Romero Hicks
The University of Texas at Dallas
Richardson, Texas, U.S.A.
March 24, 2006
Decentralization and Democracy in Mexico: The Case of Guanajuato
Co-sponsored by the Social Science School at UTD
Juan Carlos Romero Hicks was born in the city of Guanajuato, Gto., As Governor of the State of Guanajuato, he took office on September 26, 2000, after being elected on july 2. He obtained a B.S. in Industrial Relations in 1977 from the University of Guanajuato; a Masters in Social Science in 1979 from Southern Oregon State College; and a M.B.A. in 1981 also from Southern Oregon State College. Additionally, he has taken professional training courses in the fields of psychology, personnel training and development, didactis, industrial safety, administrative auditing, educational technology, political sciences, sociology and human resource management. Juan Carlos Romero Hicks has had an intense academic life as a member of the full-time faculty of the University of Guanajuato. Since 1977, he has taught courses in the high school, undergraduate and graduate levels. Subjects taught include business administration, management, industrial relations, personnel selection, organization development, and educational planning, among others. For many years, education has been the main professional concern that has guided Juan Carlos Romero Hicks public activity due to his personal belief that education constitues the backbone of social and human development for the guanajuatenses.
During his term as Rector (President) of the University of Guanajuato the institution obtained its definitive self-governing status (autonomy). As proof of his commitment to education, he has been very active in the State of Guanajuato and in Mexico as a country concerning these issues and has held important positions in the National Association of Higher Education Institutions (ANUIES), the interamerican Organization of Universities (OUI), Latin American Universities Union (UDUAL), the College of Education, Science and Technology of the State of Guanajuato (CECyTEG), the Inter-University Center for Knowledge, the Higher Education Planning State Commission, and Educational Development of Guanajuato, A.C. among others.
Along with his work in teaching, planning and directing activities in higher education, he has also collaborated with many research and cultural institutions which include the Center for Research in Mathematics (CIMAT), the Center for Research in Optics (CIO), the Center for Research and Technological Assistance in Leather (CIATEC), Higher Education and Research of the State of Guanajuato, A.C., the National Council on Science and Technology (CONACyT), the Center for Education, Training and Technical Assistance in Agriculture (AGROEDUCA), and the State Institute Cultural Affairs, among others.
Ana Cervantes & the Tiempos Pasados
The University of Texas at Dallas
Richardson, Texas, U.S.A.
March 25, 2006
Murmurs and Celebration & Medieval, Renascent, Sefardic and Early Colonial Music
Co-sponsored by the Art and Humanities School at UTD
Ana Cervantes, soloist and collaborative artist of a Mexican father and a Nebraska mother, Ana Cervantes gives evidence in every performance of her special ability to serve as an interlocutor between cultures. Graduate of Bard College, Cervantes counts Joan Tower and Theodore Lettvin as her most significant teachers. She has served on the adjunct music faculty of Princeton University, on the artist faculty at Rider University’s Westminster Conservatory and the Fine Arts faculty of The Peddie School in New Jersey, USA. In 1999, Cervantes was given the prestigious Fulbright-Garcia Robles award, so that she could go to Mexico to develop repertoire of Mexican contemporary music for subsequent performance in the United States. In June 2002, Cervantes was awarded an Individual Artist grant from the Bossak-Heilbrun Charitable Foundation (USA) in order to further develop repertoire from the US and Mexico, to be performed in both countries.
Cervantes has performed the premieres in the US and Cuba of works by Mexican composers such as Marcela Rodriguez, Georgina Derbez, Ramon Montes de Oca, Joaquin Gutierrez Heras, among others, and as invited artist in venues such as the Warner Theatre, the Smithsonian Institution and the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, DC; the Americas Society in New York City; the Chanticleer Summer Music Festival in Richmond, IN; William Paterson University (New Jersey); the XV and XVI International Festivals of New Music of La Habana, Cuba; and the XXIX and XXX Festival Internacional Cervantino.
Cervantes now maintains an extensive concert and teaching activity in this hemisphere and is based in the city of Guanajuato, Mexico, where her Mexican grandparents were married in 1914. There she teaches chamber music and collaborates in academic and musical projects at the University of Guanajuato with composer Ramon Montes de Oca (associate professor of the School of Music of that University), as well as serving as advisor to the Institute of Culture of the State of Guanajuato.
Tiempos Pasados
In 1972, the early music ensemble Los Tiempos Pasados, directed by Armando Lopez Valdivia, began its adventure of recreating the art of early music for modern audiences. The group, whose name translates literally as “ages past,” acts as a cultural ambassador of the University of Guanajuato through the School of Music and the Cultural Extension program’s Early Music Workshop. The richness of the ensemble’s arrangements is the result of an eclectic mix of early and modern instruments, including the transverse flute with its multiphonics and the Arab oud, and the creativity which these instruments inspire. No two concerts are ever alike; the performances draw on the fertile ground of early and modern Eastern music, transformed by the creative interpretations of the musicians who have at their disposal more than three hundred instruments from various latitudes and periods. The ensemble, founded by Scott C. Shwartz and Armando Lopez Valdivia, has performed in many different venues both in Mexico and abroad. In Mexico, Los Tiempos Pasados has appeared in some of the country’s most important events, including the International Cervantino Festival, Festival Cervantes en Todas Partes and Jornadas de Musica Antigua; abroad, the group has participated in early music festivals and other international festivals in the United States, Colombia and Puerto Rico.
Highly versatile, “Los Tiempos Pasados” has played with a number of important artists including Munir Bashir (Iraq), Hamza el Din (Egypt), Dante Andreo (Argentina), Donald Joice (USA), Ars Nova (Mexico), Scott C. Schwartz (USA), Gerard Edery (Morocco), Camerata Hungarica (Hungary), Groupe Vocal Gregor (Spain), Enric Madriguera (USA), Pilar Rioja (Mexico), Nati Mistral (Spain) and the Terra Nova Consort (Oregon, USA). Also worthy of mention is the ensemble’s collaboration with important theater director and playwright Juan Ibanez, performing original music for the plays: Siempre es Hoy, Divinas Palabras, Mezcla and Espectaculos de Poesia Contemporanea y Musica Antigua. The group has also performed in the White House, at the 1981 Cancun Summit, in Mexico’s Presidential mansion Los Pinos, and for an assortment of foreign ministers, presidents, kings and other important world figures.
Los Tiempos Pasados has recorded six albums, testimony to a 32-year musical adventure and to the more than three generations of musicians who have contributed their talent and imagination along the way.
Musicians:
Director: Armando Lopez Valdivia
Beatriz Eleanor Lopez Wunsch, Karla Lopez Wunsch, Rafael Cuen Garibi, Jose Luis Ramirez Santoyo, Jose E. Vidaurri Arechiga, Rodrigo Nefthali Lopes, Maria Guadalupe Wunsch C.